


Little Yellow Socks

by Measured



Category: How I Met Your Mother
Genre: Community: cottoncandy_bingo, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2015-05-14
Packaged: 2018-03-30 12:00:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3935995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Measured/pseuds/Measured
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"We're not naming our child Umbrella."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Little Yellow Socks

**Author's Note:**

> Cottoncandy_bingo: shower (event). Finale, what finale?

When she saw two stripes of red on the pregnancy test, the only thing she felt was an overwhelming sense of peace. Her first impulse was to tell him, to see the look of happiness on his face as he finally got the family and happy end he wanted.

Every day at work passed with that thought, the mental note to tell him everything. One day he'd reuse her anecdotes, spruced up and told with more love and spirit she ever could manage. Somewhere between a story about licking the Liberty Bell, and how he'd gotten his heart broken again, he'd became not just a boyfriend or fiancee, but her closest friend.

There wasn't a what if, a second thought. She'd tell him right off, right in the bar he set so many of his stories in.

*

Marshall and Lily had gone for more drinks. He slid into the red bar seat right across from her. Empty bottles and cans of Arizona green tea filled the table. He'd gone out for beer and to call his parents with the news, and had come back with a pair of little yellow socks. His expression was tender, and kind, and she was reminded all over again why she'd fallen in love with him in the first place.

He brought out something yellow like a magician, like he'd been taking lessons from Barney just for this surprise. There were little duckies on the impossibly small socks.

"Sock," Ted said. 

"Oh, sock," she said.

" _Sock_ ," he said again.

And when he held his hand out, socks and all, she took it. 

It hadn't even been a day, and he was already stocking up. Soon there'd be onesies picked up on every trip out to work. He'd probably told the cashier at the Baby Gap not just the news, but his entire life story.

"Gender-neutral, and yellow. Speaking of things that are yellow--"

She cut him off. "We're not naming our child Umbrella. I'm not having people singing Rihanna lyrics at them for the rest of their life," she said.

"Actually, I was thinking Luke, or Leia if it's a girl," Ted said.

She recognized that smile, the mere hint of a joke between his friends, a ploy which hadn't started with him. She recognized so many facets of him, and this had been planned out, possibly from college when he was sitting by Marshall and having 'sandwich epiphanies.'

"Dear, I can smell the 'legendary' on it," she said. 

She leaned in to kiss him. The bottles clinked between them, but she'd long ago mastered the art of kissing him from across a booth without even spilling their drinks. 

"You can name this one Luke or Leia, but we can't have both. We can't have them being spoiled before their first trilogy time. Nobody likes a walking spoiler."

"You are the perfect woman," Ted said.

*

No one had informed Ted that baby showers usually happen later in the term, and generally not when a woman is only a month along. But, he'd put his heart into it, creating a beautiful hand-picked decorations. Somehow, he'd gotten little yellow umbrellas hung across the roof. He must have ordered them specially, fretting over every detail. He'd even gone to the trouble to cook a souffle, something which Barney and Robin had teased him about through texts throughout the day.

Lily and Marshall had said they'd come later, due to Marvin's sitter arriving late. Tracy suspected there'd be another person on Lily's 'dead to me' list before the night was over.

Barney and Robin hadn't RSVPed, but it was to be expected. Barney reveled in the surprise, leaping in and out of their life, sometimes literally, and sometimes in superhero costume, if it happened to be Halloween, or if he was drunk enough.

But they never left for long. 

Ted wore a dark blue cable-knit sweater and jeans. He dressed like a professor long before he became one, or so his friends told her, in sly jokes that he was always the punchline of. Sometimes, they even turned his name into a verb. It was too cold for sundresses, but not too cold for a rooftop party. Perhaps the last one before their move. Out past cities, out past all his memories.

She had already started to buy clothing that draped more in preparation. So in this, Ted wasn't alone in his excitement, in how he couldn't pass a store without pointing out the life they would have together.

But for now, they were in New York for another year. Far from the in-between, and only just begun.

On the couch beside her, he laid out the last plans for the night, and more plans for their wedding, which got more extravagant every time he brought it up.

"So, souffles, and Spanish castle, with dress to rival the royal wedding, and a serenade by an entire band---"

"No Star Wars theme?" Tracy said, only half teasing.

Ted's eyes widened, as a whole new host of ideas came over him. She laughed; at this rate, she'd never get married.

"We have to have two weddings, no, _three_ ," Ted said.

"Then I hope we win the lotto, because with a Bridezilla like yourself, we'll never afford it," Tracy said. She leaned in to kiss him. She would've taken a simple trip to the courthouse, or even a Vegas trip officiated by an Elvis impersonator. He was the one who needed every grandiose moment, to treat her like no other bride had ever been.

"So, I think we've found our next Halloween costume, but you'll be the one in the wedding dress," she said.

"We'll beat Marshall and Lily's costume wars yet," Ted said.

With one last kiss, he reluctantly parted to check on the food. With them they were always one dance in the rain, one kiss in front of the sidewalk and story right out of a romantic comedy. Even on simple errands, he found ways to make it extraordinary. 

Yes, her coworkers were terribly jealous. She couldn't blame them. A year ago, had someone told her that she would stumble into happiness like this, Tracy wouldn't have believed it. Happiness had visited her once and left, until there was little but emptiness and memories.

But it'd come again, in shades of yellow.

She went up to the roof to see the hints of the city lights over the horizon, and greet the first few guests.  
Friends from work and neighbors came in. They didn't have the same homey feel, like only a few atoms away from being family. Made family, not born family, that's what Ted's group was. Even at this distance, they would find their way back. They always did.

Ted's worrying smoothed out when Lily and Marshall came up, burdened by several wrapped gifts in ducky paper. Everything had gone according to plan, which meant that something was amiss, something was coming.

The helicopter hovering above the roof was less surprising than it should have been. Given Ted's anecdotes, she had begun to expect the unexpected when it came to Barney. Caught in the spotlight and the sound, the other guests could only stare up. The last two of Ted's closest friends came off of the helicopter from a dropped ladder, like they were starring in a spy film.

Friendship was being prepared, even for the impossible.

"Top that, Ted. Oh wait, you can't, because we're too cool to have children," Barney said.

He and Robin high-fived at that, and in only seconds of landing, they were all embracing. The other friends could only witness this strange event. Another story to be added to Ted's large collection.

"You didn't forget the gifts, did you, Barney?" Lily said pointedly.

"Of course I got the gifts. Robin?" Barney said.

"I thought you got the gifts, you said you'd handle it," Robin said.

"That's what I figured. See that diaper bag over there, with the duckies? Consider that from them," Lily said.

Barney grimaced. "That's hideous, I wouldn't wish that on that poor child."

"My, my. It's the same pattern as the ducky tie. The one you'll be wearing for the next month for losing that bet," Marshall said. There was just the hint of a Batman villain to his look.

"Slap bet commissioner says so," Lily said.

"It doesn't count anymore, I'm free of slap bets---" Barney said, with just a hint of sharpness and fear in his voice.

Lily lifted one brow. "Slap bet commissioner says no."

Marshall put his arm about Lily's back. "And everyone knows that what Slap bet commissioner says is law."

"Robin?" Barney said, with fear in his voice.

"If we leave now, we can be in Bermuda by sundown," Robin said. She reached up for the rope ladder.

"I call a temporary truce," Tracy said. "You've already shocked the neighbors enough for one night."

"Ted, your wife is great," Barney said.

And Ted just smiled. "I know."

"You're still going to have to wear that tie," Lily said.

Tracy nodded to this, and Barney knew when he'd been defeated. Jokes and slap bets aside, the distance left like it was never there at all. Like it didn't take forty six minutes to see Marshall and Lily again, like they'd never left the bar at all.


End file.
